For Windows 365 VMs (that are still managed by Citrix... but even for ones that aren't), is there any reason to use Microsoft's Windows Desktop Optimization Tool over Citrix Optimizer? I see nothing special in WDOT outside of a clunky implementation.

last time I used WDOT it broke the VM (was AVD). Didn't gave it a second chance

New'ish WDOT shouldn't crash anything if you are careful. By default it removes lot of stuff you dont want to be removed. CTXOptimizer is more conservative here. I would go with CTXOptimizer if you still have the Citrix license or account to download it. But according to some tests I did the user experience is not that much improving if using an optimizer in single session...

Yeah, I don't expect much improvement. If anything, I want to keep the environment consistent.

@Markus Zehnle, that's an interesting statement. We've seen a massive impact before and after optimizing your W11 desktop.

I should‘ve rephrased „…if using an optimizer in single session.“ or be more specific to W365 CloudPC (Enterprise) here. In „VDI“ (On-Prem or AVD with „own“ images) scenarios I definetly go for optimizations.

my two cents: IMO every image needs to be optimised. This applies to non-persistent and persistent images, regardless of whether they are your own or provided by MSFT.

Yeah, for me it's more of 'which method' than anything. I used to use VMware OSOT back in the day, but it was cumbersome and buggy. Switched to using Citrix Optimizer exclusively and it doesn't look like that will change, it seems.

When it's not my compute, I don't really bother with optimizer much on single-session OS - but multisession, absolutely 😉